Fleeing the Apollonian Marriage Bed: Daphne and the Discourse of Desire

Abstract

This qualitative, textual hermeneutic study explores what influences female sexual desire inside of a heterosexual marriage via an archetypal approach to the Apollo and Daphne myth. The methodology includes Hillman’s psychologizing process and imaginal dialogues with the mythic figures. Both Ovid’s version of the myth and Bernini’s statue of the mythic pair serve as an imaginal gateway into the phenomena of low or absent female sexual desire inside the marriage bed. Western culture’s inherited, dominant, heterosexual discourses are examined and characterized as Apollonian in nature, possessing solar, performance-based qualities that lack intimacy. Shadow elements of this sexual style are interpreted as phallocentric, materialistic, and misogynistic. A lunar sexual style is illuminated via the mythic characters of Daphne and Dionysus. The power of dominant sexual discourses to penetrate the personal and collective psyche are illustrated and the mythic Daphne becomes a symbol of the effects of these discourses on the female psyche and soma. In this interpretation of the myth, Apollo’s solar sexuality robs her of the unique expression of her sexuality and encages it inside of the constrictive narrative of obedience found inside the heterosexual discourse. Implications for depth psychology are the obligation to deeply understand this legacy and to approach sexuality from a symbolic and embodied stance so as to be in service to both soul and soma. Emerging, sexual technologies and their influence on human sexuality are addressed.